Mellanoveckan Diary, Day 7

Postat den 22 augusti 2009 kl. 12:16

We woke up at half past nine as we went to sleep at 4 o’clock in the morning. We were in Stockholm City all night long. We are so tired now. We didn’t do the yoga today because we woke up too late, the yoga was at half past seven. We took our breakfast quickly because at 10 o’clock Pierre was going to . Pierre is a famous grafitti artist from Stockholm, he’s a betweenshipper as well because his father’s from Greece.

When Pierre arrived, we spoke all together about our painting and we put the plastic and the paper on the wall. Each one has his own paper to paint on it. The size of the whole paper is 2 meters x 1, 50 meters.

We painted for 5 hours, from 10 am to 3 pm, and took lunch quickly at 12. When we finished all of us were really happy because it was the first time for most of us to do this kind of painting. Pierre was really happy as well. This activity was very interesting because each and every one expressed his/her opinion on betweenship in painting instead of just words.

At 3 pm all of us went to sleep as we were so tired. We slept during one hour and at 4.30 we went to the stadium of Alby to play a football match against the Swedish team. Frida organized this match. A cousin of Frida's and his friend played with us. We played 7 against 7. At the beginning we were losing 3 – 1, but in the end we won at 5 – 4. It was a wonderful and amazing match.

We finished the match at about 6.30. We played for 2 hours. When we finished, all of us were too thirsty so we went to the shop to buy some drinks and a cake for Frida’s birthday. We came back at home at about 7.30. It was nice because there were a lot of people there. We washed quickly and we were ready at 8 o’clock for the party. The party was at home and was better than the other parties out in the nightclubs.

There was so much food, very good people, music and a good dancing also. We joked a lot during the party and spoke about our week. The party was finished at about midnight. After that some of us went to the city to continue the party in the bar where Nathan was DJ-ing. The other people stayed at home because they were so tired.

This week was prefect. It was really interesting to see the different viewa and opinions about betweenship. Our conclusion is that: it’s a big pride to have 2 identities. For us 1 + 1 = 3 : because with our two identities we are stronger than if we had only one.

Mellanoveckan Diary, Day 6

Postat den 2 augusti 2009 kl. 11:30

The day started as usual: morning yoga with yogi guru Olivia to get good energy for the new day. After yoga class we had breakfast with yoghurt, muesli and lots of yummi stuff! A journalist from the local newspaper Södra sidan paid us a visit and we had a discussion about racism and problems connected to that in France versus Sweden. We talked about the differences of racism in the two countries which look quite unalike in many ways, a racism that is however based on the same ignorance, prejudice, fear of losing what you have and the unwillingness to change. We also talked about the growing fascism in France, Italy, Denmark and Sweden. Politicians who support and encourage racist ideas and ideologies instead of fighting them. The intolerant society where there is no space for differences and diversity, and the lack of a "two-way understanding".

Later on we walked together to cultural center Subtopia where César gave us a guided tour and told us about some of the 40 organizations working there. Everything from circus groups to film and media, music, dance an theatre. At Subtopia we had an intensive lesson in filipino martial arts with Taekwondo master Madeleine. She taught us useful moves such as "Apchagi" (the front kick), "Pichagi" (the half roundkick), and "Dwichagi" (the deadly horsekick).

After a lot of sweat, tears and mortal combats we walked back home to the hangar where Anna had made some delicious pasta gratin with salmon and beans. After melting that magical dinner, we crawled downtown and continued our discussion at Babylon bar in Medis. We went to Kulturhuset and sat for a while on the roof where there was a release party for a new comic book album, "Frances". But since there were complaints about the present whiteness among the crowd, we decided to go to Club Studio ONE with Trinity Sound at Södra Teatern to get some contrast... We had a splendid time! The French dominated the dancefloor all night, but the "Swedish people very tired"... ;)

The guys tried their best to break thru the Swedish ice, while Maïna played slow and fonky!

Mellanoveckan Diary, Day 5

Postat den 1 augusti 2009 kl. 11:37

This day was filled with cultural excitement. We started out by visiting two artists who both have understanding for the betweenship in different ways, one through having been forced to move around because of family and the other through her foreign family roots. Marcus Mårtenson and Valeria Montti Colque express a lot of their frustration and thoughts in their art, which they let us take part in making today. Out of a pile of pure garbage we created an amazing BetweenShip proving how far we can make it in this world using our creative minds as tools.

In the afternoon Nathan took us on a unique sightseeing, combining must-know Swedish (betweenship) history with interesting facts about Stockholm and Sweden's music culture.

Mellanoveckan Diary, Day 3

Because of last night’s partying, we delayed the start of the day until 10 a.m. People were more or less eager to try yoga. Kamel, Daphne, Olivia and Ouzin even managed to do a headstand!

For breakfast we had quite the same thing as yesterday. Afterwards we walked to the Multicultural Center which is situated in Fittja, near where we are. There we met Tobias Hübinette and René León Rosales who explained what their jobs consist of. Thanks to René we understood a bit more concerning the Million Programme which was a modern initiative at the beginning, but quickly became a deception. Soon after the Million Programme was completed, more and more people with immigrant backgrounds started to populate these areas. A new fact for the French people was that not only people of color but even people who, by physical appearance, could pass as Swedes, are seen as inferior to the Swedes if they have an accent and people by that accent can tell that they are not originally from Sweden.

We also learned that out of Sweden’s population of 9.000.000, 85.000 are adopted, many from South Korea which pointed also highlighted the complex issue of hybridity; e.g. Tobias Hübinette stated that adoptees, in a way, cannot reproduce as their children will never share their own experiences of adoption. After the lecture and Tobias’ documentary about adoptees, we proceeded to an exhibition about societal norms and expectations on families where we discussed norms and values together with René. We learned that there is a difference concerning same sex marriages and adoptions of children by same sex couples between France and Sweden; legal in Sweden but not yet permitted in France. Some norms were confronted in discussion by some members of the group. The visit to the Multicultural Centre was interesting and we all learned a lot about Sweden, integration and societal norms.

After our visit to the Multicultural Centre, the group split up - some people going back to Subtopia and others heading in to town for shopping and eating.

Mellanoveckan Diary, Day 1-2

Postat den 28 juli 2009 kl. 21:09

The Betweenship exchange between France and Sweden has started. This whole week, ten betweenshippers from Bagnolet, Paris and Sweden are staying at Subtopia's Hangar in Alby. We'll continue posting the diary through the week, the first post is written by Olivia and Hager:

Yesterday we all arrived here to the Subtopia Circus Hangars in Alby, Stockholm.

We came early in the night, had dinner together and presented ourselves to eachother. We got to see our rooms and got to know the names of the other participants in the Mellano Project, which is why we are here all together. We discussed a little about our identity within the betweenship and why we felt as mellanos.

Today was the first day of our project week, we started off by having a yoga class in the grass outside of our house, at 07:30 in the morning. For some of us it was the first yoga class ever and we were really tired when we had to wake up that early after a long night.

We prepared breakfast and ate together, it was a bit different to the french participants since we only eat something sweet with coffee in France, not like here were it was even tomatos and cucumber at the table.

After that we met with the graffiti artist Zappo who presented his work and some history of the artform to us. He told us about the zero tolerance for graffiti and the difficulties of this form of expression. The differences between the systems in other cities compared to Stockholm and also in other places of the world. We discussed the different perspectives of graffiti and variations of how to percept the artform. Then we chose our colours, the ones we will use when making our own graffiti mural later this week. We also did some sketching.

Then we prepared burgers made of lentils and feta cheese, with fries, salad and grilled aubergines with cheese on top. We had lunch together at 13:00.

After lunch we proceeded by having a lecture and discussion held by Christian Catomeris, who is a journalist for SVT. Christian presented different pictures and we discussed the history of racism and the different perceptions of the black man throughout the ages. We also went on discussing politics and the working situation for mellanos in France and Sweden.

After the break Interfem came to discuss anti-racism and feminism. We talked about different issues concerning identity and perceptions of feminism, which are very different in France compared to Sweden.

It has been a very interesting and instructive day, we have seen many different ways of looking at the betweenship and what we are individually and together experiencing. Now we will soon be off to help prepare dinner and then we will go to the hip-hop festival "X-press yourself" at Debaser Slussen, in the center of Stockholm.